Professor Infanti’s scholarly work focuses on two ostensibly quite different, but, in reality, quite related areas: (i) the intersection of tax and comparative legal theory and (ii) critical tax theory (i.e., the impact of the tax system on traditionally subordinated groups). Professor Infanti has published numerous articles and book chapters in these areas. He is also the author of Everyday Law for Gays and Lesbians (and Those Who Care About Them) (Paradigm Publishers), co-editor of Critical Tax Theory: An Introduction (Cambridge University Press), and editor of Controversies in Tax Law: A Matter of Perspective (Ashgate Publishing).

At present, Professor Infanti is working on two book projects. The first project is titled Our Selfish Tax Laws (The MIT Press, forthcoming 2018). This project brings together Professor Infanti’s work in comparative legal theory and critical tax theory in an attempt to shift how we see our tax system. This project uses comparative legal research to show how tax law is shaped by its social, political, and cultural context. Shaped as it is in this way, the U.S. tax system paints a picture of American society that lets us see those who are included in the collective American “self” (i.e., those whom we value, validate, and support) as well as the many “others” whom we dismiss or leave out because they fail to meet this “ideal.”

Once we understand this expressive power of our tax system, it is easy to see that taxes are about much more than just economics or finances. Our tax laws are a reflection of ourselves—of our society as it is and as we wish it would be. This shift in perspective is important both because it provides the foundation for critical tax scholars to reframe their contributions in order to have greater impact on tax reform debates and because it helps us all to understand why we must heed critical tax scholars’ calls for reform. After all, it is only once we understand the “selfishness” of our tax laws that we can work together toward creating a fairer and more inclusive tax system—one that reflects our continuing aspiration toward a fairer and more inclusive society that embraces and benefits all Americans.

The second project is titled Feminist Judgments: Rewritten Tax Opinions (Cambridge University Press, forthcoming 2017). Professor Infanti is co-editing this volume with Professor Bridget Crawford of Pace Law School (with whom he earlier co-edited Critical Tax Theory: An Introduction). This new book is the first volume in Cambridge’s Feminist Judgments series, which was spurred by the publication of Feminist Judgments: Rewritten Opinions of the United States Supreme Court (of which Professor Crawford was also one of the co-editors). In keeping with the theme of this series, Feminist Judgments: Rewritten Tax Opinions aims to demonstrate the transformative potential of feminist analysis for tax law.

Tax law is, of course, primarily statutory in nature; however, tax statutes are rarely determinative on their own and require interpretation and application that is often influenced by the context in which the parties and the court are operating. One of the underlying claims of this book is that perspective matters in all areas of judicial interpretation, not only with respect to constitutional questions. The book will demonstrate that judges may decide tax issues involving both fundamental constitutional principles, such as equal protection, as well as more prosaic statutes in ways that are consistent with their judicial roles and established methods of interpretation while applying feminist perspectives to advance the goal of equal justice. The book will also combat the notion that tax law is a pseudoscientific subdiscipline of economics in which application of the law is foreordained by economic principles or precepts. Instead, the book will show that tax law is a product of the larger social, political, and cultural context in which it operates and that tax law decisions are contingent and that the history and development of tax law can take (and could have taken) a multiplicity of different paths.

Professor Infanti teaches a variety of tax courses at Pitt Law, including Federal Income Tax, Corporate Tax, International Tax, and Estate & Gift Tax. He has also co-taught Pitt Law’s Low-Income Taxpayer Clinic and has served as a Faculty Editor of the Pittsburgh Tax Review since its founding in 2003. Professor Infanti has received both the University of Pittsburgh Chancellor’s Distinguished Teaching Award as well as an Excellence-in-Teaching Award from the graduating students of the University of Pittsburgh School of Law. He is an elected member of the American Law Institute, the American College of Tax Counsel, and the American Bar Foundation.

Scholarly Articles:

The House of Windsor: Accentuating the Heteronormativity in the Tax Incentives for Procreation, 89 Wash. L. Rev. 1185 (2014) (invited submission for a symposium issue titled "Compensated Surrogacy in the Age of Windsor"). On D-Scholarship.